One Nation set to unveil candidate

One Nation will announce a candidate within days for the seat of Kalgoorlie in the 2017 State election, with Pauline Hanson’s party still waiting on registration from the WA Electoral Commission.

Local party powerbrokers Marye Louise Daniels and Ron McLean are understood to be interviewing the chosen candidate today.

It comes after the appointment of Colin Tincknell, a former Claremont footballer with more than a decade’s experience working in the northern Goldfields, as the State leader for One Nation in the lead-up to the upcoming ballot.

Mr Tincknell was most recently employed as a community relations officer for Cameco Australia, the Canadian mining giant seeking to bring the world’s largest uranium deposit into production near Wiluna.

He was recently appointed as a director of the Wiluna-focused not-for-profit the Murlpirrmara Connection, the organisation that runs the annual Wiluna Martu Eagles Dalkeith-Nedlands cultural football weekend.

In the mid-90s, Mr Tincknell helped establish a football program in the Ngaanyatjarra Lands, before running unsuccessfully for a One Nation Senate seat at the 1998 Federal election.

Robin Scott, who ran for the Federal seat of Kalgoorlie for One Nation in 2001 and 2004, drawing a paltry 8.6 and 2.63 per cent of the vote, respectively, is among the frontrunners for preselection in the Lower House, but is understood to not be the intended candidate for Kalgoorlie.

One Nation ended its first run in politics on the outer after being slid to the bottom of the preference list by both major parties.

Neither Liberal nor Labor have indicated what they will do when the election comes around, although Premier Colin Barnett did insist last month that One Nation were a different prospect since Pauline Hanson’s shock return to the political stage.

This weekend, she cut Queensland candidate Shan Ju Lin for making anti-gay comments on social media, and has entered a public stoush with controversial WA Senator Rod Culleton.